Add support for Windows

[lmayorga1980]

[creationix]

Are you using bash on windows? Also there are nvm projects for windows like https://github.com/hakobera/nvmw

[eirslett]

Why aren't nvm and nvmw merged into one single project?

[ljharb]

Because then anyone wishing to work on nvm would have to test on Windows (a pretty burdensome request), and anyone working on nvmw would have to test on *nix.

[mcandre]

@ljharb We can automate these tests with various tools. E.g., Firefox developers don't have to manually test their commits on Windows, Mac, and Linux.

[ljharb]

Automated browser and linux testing is a solved problem - I'm not personally familiar with any free/open source solutions for automating non-IE Windows-based testing.

That said, if someone wants to submit a PR that can run automated tests on Windows, that would absolutely clear one of the bigger obstacles to supporting it.

[coreybutler]

For what it's worth, I recently released nvm for windows. It's not a direct port of this project, but it provides the major functionality. It's written in Go, so theoretically it could support OSX/Linux using the same code base if I/someone felt like tweaking it.

[ljharb]

@coreybutler there's already "nvmw" - please do not name your project "nvm", as that's the name of this project.

[coreybutler]

@ljharb - I wrote mine as a response to the fact nvmw broke after node 0.10.26, and according to the author's comments in an issue, he doesn't know how to fix it... and I found it easier to write something new than keep contributing to that code base.

If it's really a problem to have the name "nvm for windows", I can change it... but as a Windows AND Mac user that has to switch between Operating Systems regularly, I can say I wish there were a consistent cross-OS command. I can't tell you how many times I typed "nvmw" on Mac or "nvm" on Windows. While minor, the user experience is still annoying. This was a first attempt at easing that annoyance.

@creationix - Thoughts about naming? I'm not trying to step on toes here... nvm was the inspiration for my project... I just needed the functionality on Windows and the other available projects weren't solving the problem.

[ljharb]

Ah, I wasn't aware nvmw was broken. Even if it wasn't, it's of course always fine to develop an alternative to a tool :-)

Note, I'm not suggesting you shouldn't use an executable named "nvm" for consistency - I'm suggesting that the actual name of the repo/project shouldn't just be "nvm".

[coreybutler]

@ljharb - fair enough - I renamed the repo to nvm-windows to show some separation.